


An Introductory Course on Inter-House Relations

by xylodemon



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: First Time, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-04-06
Updated: 2006-04-06
Packaged: 2017-10-29 10:30:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/318930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xylodemon/pseuds/xylodemon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blaise doesn't think there's anything wrong with not wanting to get involved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Introductory Course on Inter-House Relations

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wildestranger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildestranger/gifts).



> Written for [](http://wildestranger.livejournal.com/profile)[**wildestranger**](http://wildestranger.livejournal.com/) and [](http://hp_springsmut.livejournal.com/profile)[**hp_springsmut**](http://hp_springsmut.livejournal.com/) 2006.

**1.**

Sometimes, Blaise imagines the water pressing against the walls.

His dormitory is dark and uncomfortably cold in the way dungeons are prone to be. He shifts deeper into the thick blankets in search of warmth, and the creak of the bed cuts through the muted rasp of the soft material sliding over his legs. Draco's shallow, even breathing suggests he's asleep, but Blaise knows better. Waiting, he searches the green damask stretched over his head for the answers to Draco's unasked questions.

"I'm going to do it," Draco says softly.

They've had this conversation more times that Blaise cares to recall, and unwilling to add fuel to Draco's fire, he replies with something close to a grunt. Sleep edges the noise, and Blaise hopes Draco will take the hint and either keep quiet or bugger off to his own bed.

Blaise would prefer the latter.

"I am," Draco insists. He presses closer and pillows his head on Blaise's shoulder, upsetting the delicate and precise blanket arrangements. "Soon."

No such luck, on either account.

"Of course you are," Blaise says flatly.

"Old fool," Draco says, mostly to Blaise's collarbone. "He has it coming." Draco stirs against Blaise's side, apparently restless. "Quick and painless is more than he deserves."

"I'm sure," Blaise murmurs. Draco's Dumbledore-related rants have increased in both frequency and rancour over the recent months. Their housemates seem to view this new rhetoric as something akin to gospel, but Blaise sees an eleventh-hour attempt at rationalising murder.

"He's ruined this school, the way he caters to Mudbloods and halfbreeds."

Draco's body is so taut he's practically quivering, and with a sigh, Blaise reaches for his wand. He wants sleep -- or, failing that -- more sex, and there clearly won't be either because Draco is quickly working himself into a snit.

" _Lumos_."

In the weak, yellowish light Draco looks worse than usual. His face has taken a haggard look of late -- skin that's far too pale, dark shadows lingering under his eyes. He's lost weight since term started; it's evident in the sharp hollows of his cheeks.

If Blaise had been presented with this Draco in fourth year he'd have never laid a hand on him.

"Manipulative," Draco goes on. "He's been using us from the first. All of us; Slughorn, myself, Snape. Especially Snape."

"Potter," Blaise offers.

Against him, Draco bristles. "Fuck Potter."

"You have," Blaise reminds.

"I have not," Draco snaps. He shifts away and sits up. Blaise makes no move to stop him.

"Oh, he fucked you, did he?" Blaise counters.

"Vicious rumours," Draco returns. He lifts his chin, and Blaise is tempted to tell him that petulance is not attractive. Particularly in men. "Slander."

"It's slander when it's not true," Blaise replies. He wonders who Draco thinks he's fooling, the way he and Potter have been following each other all over the school for the last few weeks. "It's not slander just because you _wish_ it wasn't."

Draco favours him with an icy look, and Blaise decides to leave it alone. If he keeps on Draco might start in about Pansy -- or, worse -- the Weasley slut, and Blaise is honestly not in the mood. He can excuse Pansy on account of Slytherin solidarity or the fact that it was simply his turn, but he has no defence for Weasley, and he's not interested in looking for one at half two in the morning.

"I'll do for Potter, too, once Dumbledore is out of the way," Draco says.

"Will you?" Blaise asks dubiously. If killing Potter was that easy, everyone would be doing it.

"I most certainly will."

The bravado in Draco's voice is a spell his body language can't cast. He avoids Blaise's gaze and chews at the side of his thumb, and for three and a half seconds Blaise sees the boy he shared a train carriage with six years ago.

He sees the boy who bought Pansy a Chocolate Frog because he thought she was cute, and the boy who locked himself in the train's lav after Potter refused to shake his hand.

"Do you really think you can?" Blaise asks. The tone of his voice suggests disinterest, but part of him actually is. It's a valid question, considering the fact that Draco is not, in Blaise's opinion, anything out of the ordinary. Aside from being turned into a ferret, his crowning achievements to date are besting Granger once in Arithmancy and not falling off his broom.

"Who?" Draco asks. "Dumbledore, or Potter?"

"Either," Blaise replies. As far as Blaise is concerned, either would be some kind of miracle. Dumbledore is the most powerful wizard in the world if the propaganda can be believed, and while Potter's magical abilities are only a hair or two above average, he's apparently luckier than a Quidditch pitch full of leprechauns. "Both."

"Of course."

"Of course," Blaise repeats.

"You don't believe me?"

Blaise pretends to ponder this for a moment. "No, I can't really say that I do." Draco opens his mouth, but Blaise continues before he can get a word in. "Let's start with Potter, shall we? He did for your Dark Lord before he could walk and talk. And your Dark Lord has failed to do for him five years running."

"Your point?" Draco's voice is harsh, but he runs a rough hand through his hair -- an anxious, agitated motion -- and actions once again speak louder than words.

"My point is," Blaise begins, in the tone he saves for First Years on the rare occasions he deigns to speak to them, "your Dark Lord has never manage to do Potter any serious physical harm, and he's at least twice the wizard you are."

"Potter's had help!" Draco insists.

"Help?" Blaise snorts. From what Blaise has heard, the ranks of Potter's army were filled with the likes of Longbottom. "Potter stormed the Ministry with a handful of Gryffindors, and an Auror or two."

"And a werewolf," Draco corrects.

"Was it the full moon?" Blaise asks, lifting an eyebrow. After three years Professor Lupin is someone he can't quite picture, but he vaguely remembers a quiet, greying man who seemed neither menacing or particularly fearsome.

"No."

"Irrelevant."

"And Dumbledore--"

"Is Dumbledore," Blaise interrupts, derailing Draco's attempt to turn the subject away his own ineptitude. "You'll do for him about the same time your Dark Lord finally does for Potter."

"I don't want to talk about this any more," Draco says.

"I don't want to talk any more, period," Blaise replies. He sits up and waves in the general direction of Draco's bed. "I want to sleep."

"I can't sleep," Draco says quietly.

Blaise reaches out and snags a hand in Draco's hair.

"Do something useful with your mouth, then."

He guides Draco's head between his legs with a sharp twist of his wrist. Draco goes easily, and Blaise smiles at the silence as Draco's lips slide over his cock.

**2.**

Dumbledore's death is still the favourite topic of discussion well after the end of term, and he ignores it at home and at Diagon Alley the same way he ignored Pansy and Theodore's prattle on the train. His mother entertains an endless string of visitors in the front parlour; they bring whispers of Death Eater plots and Ministry plans and dissension amongst Potter's excuse for an army, and Blaise ignores this, too.

He spends the first half of the unbearably hot summer holiday locked in his room. He sleeps and reads and brushes up on Ancient Runes, and after the fifth interview with one of Dumbledore's _close, personal friends_ he puts his Wireless at the bottom of his wardrobe.

At breakfast, the _Daily Prophet_ tells him five Muggles were found dead outside Ottery St Catchpole, and Blaise contemplates the point and purpose of Muggles as he scans the page. Finding none, he wonders why the Dark Lord's followers waste their time killing them, and why Potter's friends waste their energy saving them.

A blurb at the bottom of page five informs him that Ministry officials are still trying to locate young Mister Malfoy for questions about a matter of utmost importance. He starts the crossword on the back page with a sigh, and finds himself tempted to use Draco as a five letter word for imbecile.

"Aren't you friends with Draco Malfoy at school?" his mother asks.

"We're in the same House and year," Blaise replies shortly, "but I wouldn't say we're friends."

His mother sips her tea and nods. "Friendship is for Hufflepuffs," she says. "Slytherins form allegiances."

Blaise bites into his blueberry scone and considered his housemates in terms of allegiances. He decides they'd resort to hexes in an argument over the colour of grass, which tells him he shouldn't bother applying the idea to his family.

His uncle recites the standard Pureblood party line like a man who almost believes it, and his cousins hang on every word that falls from his uncle's mouth. His mother says little, but Blaise has seen the way she lingers over Muggle murders in the papers, and he saw the way her lip curled when Granger walked past her on Platform 9¾.

When he finds Draco sitting in the drawing room he's not surprised in the least. Exile does not suit Draco; he seems to have lost another stone and he's paler than the alabaster bust behind him. The length and lankiness of his hair reminds Blaise of Snape, and he remembers his mother once told him that pets often look remarkably like their owners.

"Draco," Blaise says coolly. "What brings you by?"

"I was in the neighbourhood," Draco replies. His voice is light, but he's sitting stiffly and fussing with the sleeves of his shirt. "I thought I'd stop in."

"And what, hide from the Ministry in my pantry?"

"I'm not hiding!" Draco insists. "I'm--"

"Hiding," Blaise finishes firmly. He studies Draco for a moment, then sits in the armchair across from the couch Draco is perched on. "What about Snape?"

"What about him?" Draco asks quickly.

"Will he be stopping in, too? Should I have Minky put on some tea, or did your Dark Lord stash him somewhere else?"

"He's..." Draco fumbles and pulls at a loose thread on his sleeve until it frees itself with a loud snap. "I honestly don't know where he is."

"Interesting," Blaise murmurs. It's somewhat of a relief to know his mother's not the only person running a home for wayward Death Eaters. Of course, it begs the question of why she's doing it, at all.

"I told you I'd do it," Draco says.

"From what I've heard, you didn't," Blaise counters.

"Yes, I did!"

"I heard you went soft at the last minute and Snape had to do it for you," Blaise continues. "At least, that's the word from Potter's camp."

"Potter's camp is a bunch of Gryffindors and Ministry rejects," Draco snaps.

"Granted," Blaise concedes, "but your camp is a bunch of brainwashed maniacs and Azkaban leftovers." Draco baulks, and Blaise shrugs. "Liars, on either end. At this point, I'm inclined to believe Dumbledore died because he was standing too close to his bird when it went up in flames."

"He's dead," Draco says. "That's what's important."

"It wasn't you who killed him," Blaise replies. "That makes you unimportant."

Silence spreads through the room, weighted by the stifling heat. Draco's couch is a fussy, red brocade thing with overstuffed arms and a sweeping back, and it makes Draco look shrunken and small.

"He's giving me another chance," Draco says quietly. "I've another assignment."

"Well, bring Snape with you," Blaise says. "That way, it might get done."

His mother is out having tea with a man Blaise suspects will soon be her next late husband, so he doesn't bother with taking Draco upstairs. He fucks Draco on the drawing room couch, bending him over the arm like a doll. Draco's pale skin blooms red under his fingers as he pins Draco down by the hips, and when his cock presses inside Draco's arse Draco lets out a noise that's almost a whine.

"Am I hurting you?" Blaise asks. He slides a hand up the curve of Draco's spine and twists his fingers in the hair at the nape of Draco's neck.

"No."

"Shame, that."

Draco shifts under him, rocking back as much as his trapped hips will allow, and Blaise moves to meet him, pushing into him with long, hard thrusts that threaten to tip Draco over the arm. Draco arches, impaling himself further while rubbing himself shamelessly against the defenceless, red brocade, and when Blaise finally reaches around to take him in hand, Draco moans low and claws at the couch, his fingers skipping over the raised pattern with a raspy, sibilant hiss.

"Whore," Blaise murmurs.

Blaise comes quietly, with a hitched, forgotten breath and Draco's skin under his mouth. Draco comes with Blaise's name on his lips, a choked mumble that's almost an afterthought, and like everything else Blaise has heard over the summer, he chooses to ignore that, as well.

**3.**

Remus Lupin is as quiet and grey as Blaise doesn't quite remember. A bit greyer around the temples, perhaps, and the dark circles under his eyes make Blaise wonder if sleepless nights are simply going around. A fresh scratch curves across his cheek just under the bone, and Blaise finds himself counting off the days until the next full moon.

"You won't be happy here," Lupin says. He cradles his teacup in long fingers and taps the topmost against the rim.

Here is a large, painfully cheery house on the wrong side of Manchester with spotless picture-windows and lace curtains that sway in the summer's excuse for a breeze. Blaise can't shake the idea it was a Muggle place before someone put in a Floo, but Potter's in no hurry to tell anyone who it belonged to before he commandeered it for the cause of righteousness and the light.

"I'm not sure I'd be happy anywhere," Blaise replies, in a strange moment of honesty. He's rarely this open with anyone, but he doubts Lupin has the resources or energy to do anything potentially damaging with the information.

Lupin sips his tea in a way Blaise finds irritatingly British. His bubbly, pink-haired girlfriend flutters around him like a demented and horribly clumsy butterfly, behaviour which Lupin seems to both enjoy and endure with slightly pathetic fondness.

"More scones?" she asks, and Blaise ponders the idea of a domesticated Auror.

"No," he replies shortly, and Lupin gives him an extremely pointed look. Blaise supposes it's no stranger than the idea of a domesticated werewolf. "But thank you."

"Didn't hurt, did it?" Lupin queries. Blaise can't decide if he's serious.

"Only a little," Blaise replies. "Mainly around the House pride."

Lupin sighs like a man who has _ideas_ about the House system. "The Hat wanted me for Slytherin, you know," he says finally. "It dithered about it for a full ten minutes."

Blaise snorts. "They'd've eaten you alive."

"Yes," Lupin admits, "but once a month, I'd've eaten them. The Hat probably figured that was a fair trade." He pauses and sips his tea. "It wanted Harry for Slytherin, too."

Potter chooses that moment to slam through the kitchen, and Blaise leans back in his chair, studying the hero of Muggles, Mudbloods, and miscreants as he saunters past with his broom slung over his shoulder. He's grown almost half a foot in the two months since term ended, and he's thinner while somehow broader.

"Bit hot for that, isn't it?" Lupin asks. He releases his death-grip on his teacup and gestures at Potter's broom.

"Yeah," Potter agrees, "but I needed some fresh air." Smiling, he snatches a scone from Lupin's plate. "I'm off; Hermione wants to talk about something she read last night."

He pauses long enough to favour Blaise with a sneer that beats Draco's patented glare in all categories. Blaise thinks of the sullen boy who played the bereaved widow at Dumbledore's funeral, but sees a loud-mouthed arsehole who's a few minions short of being a proper tyrant.

Not only would Potter have made a wretched Slytherin, the constant proximity to Draco would've made the living conditions in the dungeons unbearable. If they hadn't killed each other by second year they would've been fucking loudly and often by fourth.

The door clicks shut just as Potter bellows for Granger at the top of his lungs. Blaise decides the Hat is not -- as Theodore put it -- full of all sorts of bollocks, and Lupin sighs again.

"They're not going to accept you easily," Lupin says.

It's Blaise's turn to sigh. Lupin has a spectacular grasp of the obvious.

"Do I need them to?" Blaise asks. Lupin gives him a level look, and Blaise hopes he's not mentally dressing him as a soldier for the cause. "I really just need a place to stay until this all blows over."

"They might take that, if you weren't who you are," Lupin says.

"And who is that?" Blaise asks, and inevitably applies the idea of allegiances to his family. He comes up with nothing overly worrisome. His uncle may secretly pine for a snake tattoo, but Blaise does not, and while his mother is certainly guilty of marrying too often, she's not much of a threat to anyone who's not a good-looking bachelor with more money than sense.

"A Slytherin," Lupin says.

"Which Potter almost was."

"But wasn't," Lupin continues. "Harry's never met a Slytherin he didn't hate. And the one he was told specifically to trust turned out to be more trouble that he's worth."

Blaise's head starts to ache dully. Leave it to Potter to make him a partisan example just because Snape tried to play Quidditch for both teams.

"I've no mind to kill Muggles," Blaise says. "Granger is perfectly safe, if that's what he's worried about."

"But you've no mind to save them, either," Lupin counters.

"Not particularly," Blaise admits. "I don't much see the point either way."

"This isn't only about Muggles," Lupin explains, in a tone that's annoyingly professor-like. "It's about Voldemort and his parents and his godfather and equality for Muggleborn wizards and education for werewolves and a hundred other things you're likely not interested in."

"You're right, if we're being perfectly honest," Blaise says. "Like I said, I just need a place to stay until this all blows over."

"What makes your own home out of the question?" Lupin asks.

Blaise pauses, and thinks about the last week he spent at home. His mother's anonymous owls, and her afternoon dates with a Lestrange. His hand wrapped around Draco's Dark Mark while Draco sucked him off in the hallway cupboard. His uncle ranting about Pureblood superiority at dinner, and his cousins parroting the very same tripe as they played Wizards and Goblins in the garden.

"It's not necessarily out of the question," Blaise replies. "There's just been been a lot going on, recently. Too much activity. I'm tired."

"You've come to the wrong place, if you're looking for peace and quiet," Lupin says. His point is driven home by feet thundering down the stairs and Granger shouting for Weasley like her life depends on it. "Do you know where Draco is?"

Blaise would like to think Draco is waiting for him to come home -- stretched out on his bed with his trousers around his ankles and his cock in his hand.

"No," Blaise says smoothly. "I haven't the foggiest."

**4.**

Blaise finds it impossible to read when he's the subject of public debate.

They've been arguing about him for close to an hour. Potter's been arguing, at any rate. Blaise assumes Lupin has managed occasional replies because Potter's caustic, tyrannical screech has stopped rattling the walls for whole minutes at a time. Granger and Weasley have chimed in once or twice, but Potter's only shouted right over them. He's apparently not interested in opinions from the sidelines.

Blaise pages through his book; a copy of _Standard Book of Spells, Grade Seven_ that he found downstairs. The 1977 copydate tells him it's several editions out of fashion, but it's an interesting enough read.

DON'T BLOODY TELL ME WHAT'S UNFAIR, REMUS! SNAPE KILLING DUMBLEDORE WAS UNFAIR! VOLDEMORT KILLING MY PARENTS WAS UNFAIR! ME NOT WANTING BLAISE FUCKING ZABINI IN THIS HOUSE IS NOT FUCKING UNFAIR!"

Would be, if Potter would shut the Hell up for fifteen straight seconds.

Blaise closes the book with a snap and tosses it toward the foot of the bed. The room Lupin sequestered him in is a tiny thing at the rear of the second floor with a distressingly small window that overlooks an adjacent brick wall. The trunk in the corner and the shirt over the chair give Blaise the idea that it's already occupied, but when Blaise mentioned it Lupin had only looked at him innocently before shutting the door in his face.

The bed creaks quietly as Blaise stretches back against the pillows, and an overly-warm attempt at a breeze struggles to find the ridiculously small window. Potter's voice pierces the floor like a knife, and Blaise thinks _at least Draco doesn't shriek_.

Blaise doesn't so much miss Draco as miss his mouth.

Potter's next outburst is accompanied by a loud bang, since dictators the world over gain the respect of their legions through tantrums, and Blaise wonders if the forces of good realise their leader is a spoilt, overgrown child. Another bang follows shortly, louder than the first, then silence. Maybe someone downstairs finally found the sense God gave a kneazle and hexed Potter with laryngitis.

The rasp of his zip cuts through the sudden stillness. He thinks of Draco as his fingers slip inside his trousers, of Draco's warm, wet mouth and the curve of his lower lip, and he hardens at the thought of Draco's slick, pink tongue.

Draco sucked him off all over the house in the two, short weeks between Draco's arrival and Blaise's departure -- in Blaise's bedroom, in the kitchen, in every cupboard and corner the house had to offer. He pushed Blaise back against the walls and furniture as he sank to his knees, his lips parting around the head of Blaise's cock and his fingers digging into Blaise's hips.

Blaise twists his wrist, bringing his hand up his cock slowly, thumbing the head before sliding his fingers back down. He pictures Draco on his knees and tangling his hands in Draco's hair as Draco swallows him whole, and he arches up off the bed, pushing himself into his hand.

He comes with a hiss, a soft noise that trips over his lips as he spills between his fingers. The sun glares at him through the tiny window, bright and searing, and Blaise rolls over without bothering to do up his trousers.

Blaise wakes to near darkness and an arse in his face. The apparently late hour is a point of confusion because he swears he only just went to sleep, and he thinks the arse is somewhat decent until he realises it belongs to Longbottom.

"What the Hell are you doing in here?" Blaise asks.

"Sorry," Longbottom says quietly. He's wearing the kind of blue and white pyjamas Pomfrey passes out in the infirmary, but only the trousers. The shirt hangs limply from his hand. "I didn't mean to wake you. I was just getting ready for bed."

"In here?" Blaise leans up on his elbows and favours Longbottom with a nasty look.

"Well, it's my room, isn't it?" Longbottom asks.

"Is it?"

"Yes."

Longbottom regards him a bit blankly; Blaise thinks he'd be rather more irritated if he found someone he didn't like in his bed. With his trousers open, which Blaise's are. He realises this when Longbottom's sweeping gaze lingers over his zip. Longbottom punctuates the discovery with a frown.

Blaise makes no move to rectify the situation. It's only Longbottom.

"Lupin said I was to sleep in here," Blaise insists.

Longbottom seems unsurprised by this, which makes Blaise think he knew beforehand, and he also thinks he maybe should've stayed at home, where he had his own room and Draco's mouth and he didn't have to sleep with Longbottom. He wonders if an eventual Dark Mark would be the lesser of two evils.

"We've more people than rooms," Longbottom says sensibly. "Everyone's doubled up. I wasn't only because we were odd numbered."

As this is house full of Gryffindors; this is when the bedroom door flies open without so much as a knock. The door frame is suddenly full of red hair and freckles, and Blaise wonders if this situation could get any more ridiculous.

"Nev, have you seen..." Complete sentences are clearly too much for Weasley; he cuts short in favour of goggling at Longbottom, at Blaise, at Blaise's open trousers.

"Hermione's downstairs, Ron," Longbottom offers. "She's in the drawing room with Harry."

"Right," Weasley replies. His eyes slide back over to Blaise in a way he probably thinks is subtle. "You got stuck with him, then?"

Longbottom shrugs. "Everyone's doubled up," he repeats. "I was lucky to have this room to myself as long as I did."

"I was wondering where Remus was going to stash him," Weasley continues, and Blaise decides Weasley has ten seconds to stop talking about him like he's not there before he goes for his wand. "Sorry it had to be you, Nev." Five seconds. "You can sleep in Bill's room, if you'd rather. He's visiting Fleur, and won't be back until the end of the week."

"Well, if there's a spare room to be had, I'll just be going," Blaise says. He swings his legs over the bed, and because Weasley's goggling is a bit unnerving, does up his trousers.

"It's my brother's, so it's only spare if I say it's spare, and for you, it's not," Weasley snaps.

"Ron," Longbottom starts.

"Night, Neville." The door clicks shut, and Blaise sits back down with a sigh.

"I'll sleep in Bill's room," Longbottom says.

"Longbottom, I don't much care what you do, as long as you do it quietly."

"All right," Longbottom says. He considers the situation a moment, then pulls his wand. " _Engorgio_ ," he tells the bed, and for a miracle, the bed actually listens. He lets it go on until it takes up most of the room, which is perfectly fine with Blaise.

He hits the lights with his wand, and flops down as far from Blaise as possible. He still hasn't put on the bloody shirt.

"Night, Zabini."

"Whatever, Longbottom."

**5.**

As it turns out, life with Longbottom isn't the painful, skin-crawling experience Blaise expected.

He doesn't snore, or talk too much, or eat in bed. Aside from his occasional habit of leaving his clothes on the floor, he's relatively tidy, and if he wanks at all he does it where Blaise can't see or hear it -- courtesies that were never extended to him by his Slytherin housemates.

Longbottom is different from the boy Blaise remembers from school, not that Blaise had paid much attention, but he is. Different. He's a little taller, and he's lost a bit of the softness that plagued him his first few terms; not all of it, but enough that he seems to have grown into it. He's still a nervous thing, but he's not the complete apoplectic mess that kept Cadawaller's Cauldrons in business and gave Snape nightmares.

He's still inescapably Longbottom, but Blaise supposes, all things considered in a house infested with Gryffindors and Weasleys and Ministry pretenders, it could be worse. After all, he could be bunking with Potter. If he was bunking with the Weasley girl he might get laid once and awhile, but it's probably better he's not, since no one ever taught her brother how to knock.

Potter's coterie prepares for the inevitable in a way that's distressingly routine. Potter shouts, Granger reads, and Potter shouts some more. Weasley acts like a buffoon, the deluded, Ravenclaw conspiracy theorist talks incessantly of Nargles, Potter shouts again, and Weasley's mother works double-time to overfeed anyone within arm's reach.

Blaise isn't sure of Longbottom's function in all this -- or, if he even has one -- but Blaise doesn't ask. Whatever Longbottom is doing, he does it quietly and outside of their room, so Blaise has plenty of time to sleep and read, and he considers himself lucky Lupin hasn't tried to put him to task.

He only really ventures downstairs for meals, and from this he learns two important and disturbing things -- the unsuspecting should avoid looking the Weasley twins in the eye at all costs, and Potter's room is also Weasley's room is also Granger's room.

"I figured she'd be in with Weasley's sister," Blaise comments. The biscuit tin on the bedside table is still full, despite the fact he's already eaten four, and he swears to God that Weasley woman won't be happy until everyone in the house is so fat they can't walk.

"Ginny's sharing with Luna," Longbottom says. He bites down on his own biscuit with an air of finality that suggests he just explained everything that has ever needed to be explained.

"They'd be three to a room, either way," Blaise continues. Granger's all right, when she's not being clever, and Blaise can't imagine why she'd want to share a room with those two cretins. "It'd make sense for her to be in with the other girls."

Longbottom stops fiddling with the dangerous-looking plant he's been molesting for the last fifteen minutes -- and seems to think is going to stay in the room with them -- long enough to fix Blaise with an extremely flat look.

"Oh," Blaise says. Longbottom's look gets even flatter. " _Oh_. That's just disgusting."

"Is it?" Longbottom asks. The plant rears its ugly head and snaps its mouth-like petals at Longbottom's fingers.

"Yes, it is," Blaise insists. "Good Lord, Longbottom. Are you feeding that thing biscuits?"

"It has a sweet-tooth," Longbottom says. "Don't you?" he adds, turning back to the plant. It grazes the tip of his finger as he offers it a bit of biscuit, and Blaise decides it also has a flesh-and-bone tooth. "How can you say it's disgusting?"

"It just _is_ ," Blaise argues. The thought of those three in the same bed doing things to each other is enough to make him want a memory charm, but Longbottom makes a face that suggests if he was bird his feathers would be ruffled, and Blaise sighs. "Am I not allowed an opinion, then?"

"You're allowed one, I'm sure," Longbottom says. "I just think that particular opinion is a bit rare from someone who's fucked Malfoy."

"There's nothing wrong with Malfoy," Blaise defends. "Physically," he adds, since there's plenty wrong with Draco in just about every other department. "He's pretty enough."

Longbottom's face does something funny. Blaise doesn't quite catch it, as Longbottom is partially hidden behind that frightful plant.

"What?" Blaise asks.

"Nothing."

"What?"

"Do you really want to know?"

Blaise sighs again. "I asked, didn't I?"

"Malfoy killed my Gran."

Blaise read about Augusta Longbottom's death in the papers. His mother's second husband had been a Longbottom relation; Blaise had been about five or six when he died. He didn't quite remember the funeral, but there'd been a reception of sorts afterwards where his step-father's family muttered about murder while his mother wept prettily into the canapés.

His mother had taken a pass on Augusta's funeral for obvious reasons, but most of Wizarding Britain had put in an appearance.

"I'm sorry," Blaise says slowly. "Did you say he killed your grandmother?"

"Yes."

The word is short and clipped and _final_ , and for a strange moment, everything _stops_.

"Son of a bitch."

"What?" Longbottom asks.

"Nothing," Blaise snaps. He slides off the bed and grabs the closest shirt. "I'm going downstairs for a bit, is all." The plant hisses at him as he passes, despite his efforts to walk wide of it. "And you better have put that thing out the window when I get back."

**6.**

He finds Lupin in the kitchen, which is unsurprising, since the kitchen is where the Weasley woman keeps the tea.

The teacup trapped in Lupin's hands is a large and gaudy affair fashioned after a Snitch. The wing-shaped handles don't actually flutter, but Blaise half-expects it to fly away when Lupin releases it long enough to add another spoonful of sugar. Blaise can't picture Lupin playing Quidditch, and he decides it must've been some bizarre gift from Potter.

... who's sitting across from Lupin with his own tea and an utterly ginormous sandwich.

"I need to speak with you," Blaise says to Lupin. He glances at Potter, who's glaring at him as well as one can glare with a mouthful corned beef on rye. "Alone."

"You may speak freely in front of Harry," Lupin replies.

"You may tell him what I say, when I done," Blaise presses. He knows Lupin will, since Potter is the leader of this merry band of misfits, but he'd just as soon do without Potter staring, shouting, or spilling crumbs on him. "He'll only have an outburst, and I've a bit of a headache."

"Harry?" Lupin asks.

"S'fine," Potter mumbles, around his sandwich. He glares again for good measure, but the mustard on the corner of his mouth dulls its edge. "I'm meant to play chess with Ron, anyway."

Potter closes the door a bit harder than necessary, and Lupin clears his throat.

"Play chess, indeed," Blaise mutters.

Lupin's face is suspiciously blank. "Tea?"

Blaise nods, and Lupin floats a teacup over to the table from the cupboard. It's plain -- white china and teacup-shaped with a perfectly normal handle -- much to Blaise's relief. Lupin fills with with a sharp rap to the brim with his wand.

"Thank you," Blaise says. Then, with a deep breath and without preamble: "Why is Longbottom here?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why is he living here?" Blaise asks. "In this house," he adds, when Lupin looks like he's about answer with another question. "Is he in your Order of the Pegasus, or whatever it is?"

"Phoenix," Lupin corrects, with a slight smile. "And no, he's not. He's not old enough. The Order is restricted to witches and wizards of legal age."

"Potter's the exception, I suppose?" The tea is both hot and bitter, and Blaise adds two spoonfuls of sugar.

"Well, yes," Lupin says. "As much as we'd like to, it's a bit hard to exclude him, with him being who he is."

"What about Weasley and Granger?"

"They're not," Lupin says. "Although, they might as well be, since Harry tells them absolutely everything."

"Which doesn't explain why Longbottom is here," Blaise says. "Or any of the other students."

"Why are you here?" Lupin asks.

Blaise sighs and resists the urge to remind Lupin he's no longer a professor. "You know why I'm here."

Lupin retreats behind his tea for several moments. He sips it thoughtfully, lingering over it so long Blaise worries he forgot the original question.

"Luna's father edits _The Quibbler_ ," Lupin says, as if that has anything to do with the price of eye of newt.

"And?" Blaise asks. His mother doesn't take _The Quibbler_ , but he once had the misfortune of reading a copy on the Hogwarts Express. It's extremely popular with old ladies and long-term patients at St Mungos, but it's also rubbish.

"It ran a story shortly after term ended -- _Interview with a Former Death Eater_ , it was called," Lupin continues. "I'm sure the story was rot, but some people didn't take it that way. The publishing office has been raided three times since, probably after the name of this former Death Eater."

"And now she's here."

"Luna and her father lived in the publishing office," Lupin explains. "They had a house of sorts above it. After the first raid, he sent Luna to us."

"She needs a place to stay until this all blows over," Blaise says.

"Same reason Hermione is here," Lupin says. "Her parents are Muggles, and defenceless. We offered to have their house protected magically, but they refused. They don't really understand what that means. Honestly, I don't think they really understand what's going on. Hermione figures it's safer for them if she doesn't go home."

Blaise sips his tea and it burns his tongue, just the way it should.

"Longbottom is here because his grandmother died," he says.

Lupin nods. "He owled Harry the morning after it happened. I brought him here from his grandmother's home that afternoon."

"I've been here two weeks, correct?" Blaise asks.

"Correct," Lupin replies. "To the day."

"How long has Longbottom been here?"

"He arrived three days before you did."

Blaise pauses, and mentally does some maths. He remembers Draco disappearing one night, and reappearing at breakfast while Blaise read about Longbottom's grandmother over his sausage and eggs.

He never gave a second thought to what Draco had been getting up to, because he honestly hadn't cared, and that afternoon, after Draco retired for a nap and his mother went out for tea, Blaise walked out his front door and straight to a Knockturn Alley inn.

Where it took him the rest of that day and all of the next to contact Potter, and another day for a bloke named Shacklebolt to fetch him.

"Lupin?"

"Yes?"

"Draco's at my house."

**7.**

Their Hogwarts Letters are delivered at breakfast by an ball of feathers that clearly has one wing in the grave. Blaise fishes his out of the porridge and wipes it on his napkin before cracking the familiar seal.

It's signed and dated by Filius Flitwick, Deputy Headmaster, for Minerva McGonagall, Headmistress.

Potter tosses his in the Floo unopened, and after a moment's consideration Weasley does the same. Granger lingers over hers, tracing the green lettering on the envelope with the tip of her finger, but she eventually hands it to Weasley, who wastes no time sending it to join Potter's and his own.

Longbottom pockets his while Potter is distracted with a verbal treatise from Granger on the uses and functions of magical lockets. When Blaise goes back upstairs, Longbottom is perched on the edge of the bed with his letter in his lap, and Blaise realises he left his own on the kitchen table.

Hogwarts isn't something he thought about when he left home, and he finds he's not in much of a hurry to think about it now. His common room probably won't be the friendliest place in Scotland -- assuming, of course, he has much in the way of housemates, at all -- and since the Hat named him for Slytherin almost immediately, he knows there's no point in asking it for a recount.

Not that he'd want one.

Potter rounds out the afternoon with a shouting match against Granger and Weasley. He tells them they should go back to school if they really want to, and yeah, he knows they said they wouldn't if he wouldn't, but he never planned to hold them to it because that's a rather stupid reason, especially for you, Hermione, since you've been preparing for NEWTs since you were eleven, so just go, if you want to, he'll be perfectly fine and it's probably safer, anyway.

His rant is peppered with the kind of sporadic, stubborn silence that suggests they're not listening to his maniacal and ear-splitting voice of reason. Blaise wonders if Potter knows he's just wasting his breath. When it comes to friendship, Gryffindors are worse than Hufflepuffs.

Longbottom corners him an hour or so after dinner.

"You going back?" he asks. He sounds almost grave.

"Are you going back?" Blaise returns.

"I don't know, yet," Longbottom says. "I mean, I sort of want to." His letter appears out of nowhere, and he turns it over in his hands. "But Harry's not."

"So I heard," Blaise says dryly. "All afternoon." By Blaise's rough estimation, all of Manchester knows Potter's not going back to school, and have probably decided the kid at the end of the block is some kind of teenage delinquent.

"He might need me," Longbottom goes on. He says it quickly, like he expects Blaise to laugh.

Blaise just barely manages not to. "He might."

Longbottom sighs, and Blaise kisses him because he can.

His mouth is smaller and softer than Draco's, but Blaise doesn't mind. He also doesn't mind the funny noise Longbottom makes when he pushes his tongue against his lips, so he does it again. And again. And he keeps doing it until Longbottom lets him in.

"Zabini."

"No talking," Blaise says, against the corner of his mouth.

"But--"

"I said, no talking."

Longbottom makes that funny noise again, and Blaise pushes him back onto the bed.

Blaise kisses him harder, and after a floundering, slack-jawed moment, Longbottom kisses him back. His hands fidget at his sides rather than finding Blaise's arse the way they should, but his tongue peeks out, tentative and a bit shy, and Blaise sucks it right into his mouth.

He trails his lips along the line of Longbottom's jaw, sucking lightly just under his ear. Longbottom shifts restlessly against him, his breath catching in the back of his throat, and his hands finally fidget their way up to Blaise's back.

"You've done this before?"

"Um," Longbottom starts, and his eyes slide closed as Blaise's fingers find the buttons of his shirt. "Yes." The shirt falls away easily, and Blaise leans his weight on Longbottom, letting his cock press against Longbottom's hip. "No." Of course.

His hands wander Longbottom's chest, mapping the skin between his navel and collarbone. "Girls?" Longbottom is softer than Draco in places, but Draco has always been too thin.

"Just the one," Longbottom admits. His fingers clench in Blaise's shirt, and deciding he'd rather have them on his skin, Blaise sits up long enough to pull it over his head.

"Weasley?" Blaise asks. He licks a wet path down Longbottom's neck; lips, tongue, just a barest hint of teeth.

"How do you know?"

"It was your turn."

"She's a very nice girl."

"I'm sure she is," Blaise says. Longbottom might be right; Blaise hadn't stayed around long enough to find out. "No boys, then?"

"No," Longbottom says, and Blaise decides he likes that answer. He'd been worried all Gryffindors harboured a latent desire to put it to Potter. Longbottom's fingers dig into his shoulders, his nails just scoring the skin. "And I thought you said no talking."

Longbottom kisses him this time, and it's a bit clumsy, but the slick slide of Longbottom's tongue against his own is definitely something Blaise can work with. He lets his teeth graze Longbottom's lower lip, enjoying the muffled moan it causes, and when he shifts against Longbottom, snagging his fingers in Longbottom's hair, he finds Longbottom is as hard as he is.

Blaise rocks his hips slowly, bringing their cocks together, and the near-perfect pressure and friction sparks a rush of heat that floods through Blaise's body. Longbottom takes the hint immediately and arches to meet him, his hips snapping up off the bed and his hands curving around Blaise's arse, and Blaise finds his mouth again, his tongue slipping past Longbottom's lips as their legs tangle together.

Longbottom takes a sharp breath when Blaise's hand drifts to his flies. A faint flush creeps over his cheeks, which Blaise thinks is rather Gryffindor, but he doesn't truly go shy or nervous, and Blaise can only take that as encouragement. He watches Longbottom's face as he pops the button and brings down the zip, and just when he thinks Longbottom can't get any pinker, his fingers slip inside and he has Longbottom's cock in his hand.

It occurs to Blaise in that moment that he never entertained the idea of Longbottom having a cock. But there it is, with Blaise's fingers wrapped around it, and Longbottom is clearly not adverse to that, because he hitches up off the bed to push himself into Blaise's hand.

Blaise strokes him slowly, twisting his wrist just slightly as he draws his hand up the length. Longbottom moans, the kind of moan that makes Blaise think too little too late about things like unlocked doors and silencing charms, but he's certainly not going to bother now -- he has a perfectly good cock in his hand and it appears Longbottom has remembered _he_ has hands because they're fumbling with Blaise's zip.

Longbottom doesn't seem quite sure what to do when he gets there, but Blaise coaxes him in the right direction by rocking his hips as a means to set the pace. Longbottom proves to be a quick study -- shame he never cottoned on this fast in Potions -- he pulls at Blaise's cock in just the right way and Blaise hisses quietly when his thumb skates over the head.

They're kissing again, the slow, molten slide replaced by a frantic clash of lips and tongue, and Longbottom's forgotten to be afraid to use his teeth, biting at Blaise's lip in a way that makes him push his cock harder into Longbottom's hand. Blaise is more than happy to return the favour, and Longbottom moans again, a low, desperate sound that rumbles over Blaise's skin as Longbottom's mouth moves to his neck.

They find a rhythm of sorts; stroking hands coupled with thrusting hips and slick, questing tongues. The bed creaks in protest, a pained shriek that threatens to drown out their murmurs and moans, and Longbottom's head drops back into the pillows, his hand leaving Blaise's arse to fist in the sheets.

Longbottom finishes as he started, spilling in Blaise's hand with the funny, little noise he made when Blaise first kissed him.

"Quitter," Blaise murmurs, but the joke's on him. Longbottom's hand slithers up his cock just once more, and that's all it takes to push him over the edge.

Perfect timing being what it's not, this is when the door flies open. It hits the wall so hard it swings back full-force, and Blaise swears right then and there -- with Longbottom's hair between his fingers and Longbottom's come splattered across his belly -- he'll teach Weasley to knock if it's the last thing he ever does.

"Neville, get up! We have to..." Weasley pauses long enough to flush redder than his hair and forget how to breath. "Bloody Hell! Jesus Christ on a Cleansweep! What the fuck are you two _doing_!"

"I wouldn't figure someone having it on with both Potter and Granger would need an explanation," Blaise snaps. "Is there something you require, Weasley, or do you just burst in on people unannounced out of habit and bad manners?"

"Zabini--"

"Ron," Longbottom cuts in. He's redder than Weasley's hair and face combined, and instead of looking at Weasley he addresses Blaise's shoulder. "What's going on?"

"We have to go," Weasley says. His declaration is followed by a clamour downstairs -- cursing and banging and enough footsteps for a centaur stampede. "Rosemerta just Flooed. Hogsmeade's being raided." He makes a frantic, helpless gesture. "Death Eaters. Get up, Nev!"

Longbottom is out from under Blaise and off the bed before Blaise can blink. Weasley casts a sour look in Blaise's direction, but leaves off in favour of fleeing the room when Potter -- from somewhere downstairs -- demands all haste at the top of his lungs.

"Shirt," Longbottom stammers. He picks up two, both of which are Blaise's, and kicks a pair of denims across the room. "Where's my shirt?"

Blaise pulls a wadded lump of cloth from under the pillow, and Longbottom snatches it right out of his hand.

"You've got it on backward," Blaise observes, and Longbottom spits out a few words Blaise never thought he'd hear Longbottom say.

"Shoes," Longbottom says, collecting himself. "Shoes, shoes, shoes." Downstairs, Potter is practically in conniptions. "Wand."

"You might want to do up your trousers," Blaise says.

"Right," Longbottom mutters. He looks at Blaise where he's sprawled on the bed, and frowns. "Aren't you coming?"

"I just did, thanks," Blaise replies.

"You know what I mean!"

"No, I'm not," Blaise says. "This is Potter's problem. And you mean to make it yours, apparently. But it's not mine."

Longbottom stares, and Blaise thinks of allegiances.

"Don't worry," Blaise says, stretching. "I'll probably be here when you get back."


End file.
